


White Lilies, Red Roses

by thesupremetrashcan



Category: Diabolik Lovers
Genre: Angst, F/M, Friendship, Gen, I don't know why I wrote this, Original Character-centric, Panic Attacks, i'm sorry i don't know what this is, oh look another diabolik lovers oc fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 22:48:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29500182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesupremetrashcan/pseuds/thesupremetrashcan
Summary: Memories always came back at the worst time - and on its heels, long-forgotten emotions.
Relationships: Mukami Ruki/Original Female Character(s), Mukami Yuuma/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 5





	White Lilies, Red Roses

**Author's Note:**

> ohhhhhh boi here we go  
> I don't know why I'm writing for this fandom, much less why I created OCs for this godawful franchise, but god I'm seven feet under in this franchise and I can't get out. I'm sorry for tossing two other OCs to the pile of original characters created for this series but I needed to get this out of my system, so yeah.

Ami didn’t really understand emotions.

It wasn't as if she couldn't feel anything—she knew the taste of defeat all too well, of pain drilled into her by beatings and now fangs—but everything was . . . Muted. Shrouded in a place where she cannot and did not reach.

It worked well for her, as a former assassin. Guilt and sympathy didn't weigh down her conscience, and when one job was over, she moved swiftly onto another. Not the best, maybe, but she was good. She was efficient. 

At least, she was good up against humans. Vampires were a different story.

Vaguely, she remembered how in the beginning, Meilen wept and clung to Ami when the nightmares became too much, days or weeks after she completed an assignment. Ami comforted in the only way she knew how—by letting her cry on her shoulder and stroking her hair in what she hoped was a soothing matter. She never knew how well it worked, but Meilen always stopped in the end. 

Ami never cried. She didn’t think much about the reason why. 

But . . . Even if given the chance, she still doesn't want the heavy burden of these feelings. Because she had seen how Meilen's emotions drowned her. The tender sweetness of her melancholy had suffocated her, until she could no longer see past the gaping void of memories and regrets.

"We could run," said Ami one day, when she was tending to Yuma's rose shrubs. It was more rhetorical than anything else. She already knew what Meilen's answer was to that anyway. 

Sure enough, Meilen shook her head. Ami didn't need to see her sign to be able to read her mind: where would they run to? There was no place to hide. The man who brought him to this mansion was intent on keeping a close watch over his 'precious experiments'. The organization wouldn't take them back, and they had no family outside of each other.

Onto plan two.

"We can always kill them."

Simple and to the point. Ami didn't like complexity unless it was in an equation. They were trained to dispose of their targets quickly and efficiently, so it was an obvious strategy to turn to. But in this situation, it would be difficult, to say the least. There were more repercussions than benefits, and she couldn't imagine what comes next.

But Meilen was good at planning. She was always meticulous, so she'll know what to do. Ami turned to look at her to gauge her reaction.

Meilen had stopped clipping the roses. Her eyes were lifeless and dark and devoid of any warmth, more doll than girl, more wraith than human. 

Oh. Right. 

_I would rather die than take another person's life._

_No matter what, I don't want to . . ._

_I can't take it anymore._

_If it weren't for you, Ami, then I would have . . ._

She pushed too hard. Why had she been so stupidly insistent? To cover her mistake, Ami added, "We don't have to do it if you don't want to. It's just another choice we can make."

A fleeting sigh, and Meilen nodded. _Alright._

And that was that. 

Meilen snipped a withered rose from its stem and held it up against the weak sunlight. Her expression softened a little, like she was looking at something precious. When she tilted her head, Ami could see a litter of healing fang marks on her neck. Most, if not all, were likely from Ruki. She spent the most time with him, and he seemed to keep her closer than any other of the brothers. 

Not for the first time, Ami wondered if the reason Meilen had against leaving was the true one. 

She touched her own marks absently, staring at the budding roses before her. It was the same shade of red as blood. It would be even starker if the petals were spilled onto the floor, or scattered across the sheets of a bed. 

An unbidden memory came to her mind's eye. She was fifteen. Her target had brought her a bouquet of white lilies. It had stood out against his black suit, and he had looked so satisfied when she accepted them. Not because he was proud that she was cradling something he had grown from hard work, like Yuma would, but rather from the satisfaction of his arm candy was so easy to please with such a simple gift.

It was Ami's first and last time she received anything nearly as pure.

But she didn't care. Her teacher told her that she shouldn't care. The gifts her targets showered with her didn't mean anything in the least. They were just . . . A means to the end.

But she couldn't shake the image away. The long, curved silhouette of the lilies, spattered with crimson. The sweet scent lingering on her skin as she tasted the metallic taste of blood in her mouth. 

Why . . . Why couldn't she stop thinking about it?

Her heart was racing unusually fast. It pounded hard in her chest and made her head spin. Budding lilies and roses burst into bloom behind her eyelids.

The sight alone made it harder to breathe. 

In. Out. In. Out. No, that's not doing any good. She could feel each inhale and exhale rattle through her chest.

White lilies. Red roses.

Blood underneath her nails, spattered on her evening gown, on the hollow curve of her throat.

Her teacher, whispering in her ear.

_Infiltrate. Seduce. Kill._

Infiltrate, seduce, kill. Infiltrate, seduce— 

No, no, _no._ Wrong thing to focus on. What she needed was to count the spaces between her breaths. She needed to steady it. 

In. Out. Her vision was blurring before her. In, and out, and in—

A warm hand landed on her shoulder, and she could vaguely register someone rubbing soothing circles over her back. Meilen? Yes, it was her. Delicate and emotional and gentle-hearted Meilen, who could once slit a grown man's throat in a blink of an eye, who was but a flickering shadow of her former self, who was fading away slowly to repent for her sins.

And yet here she was, comforting her in a moment of weakness, like Ami had done for her so many times in the past.

Meilen ran her fingers down her tense shoulders—Ami hadn't even realized she was hunched over until now. She fixed her gaze on the ground and began to count the bricks inlaid on the garden's path.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six.

Numbers were familiar. Numbers were good. They made sense and never tried to twist her around in a conversation like the socialites in high society did, like the businessmen who tried to persuade her into sleeping with them. 

Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven.

Her breathing was still uneven, but her heart was now gradually slowing down.

Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen.

Composed. She needs to be composed. Pull herself together. The weight of Meilen's hand steadied her. Grounded her.

Sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen.

With one last shuddering sigh, she straightened up again. Meilen gazed at her gravely, brows pinched together in concern. 

"I'm okay." The words came out flat and mechanical, even more so than usual. "I'm okay."

 _Are you sure?_ Meilen signed. 

"I'm okay," Ami repeated, as if she were a broken record. "It was nothing. I overreacted."

A pause. _Bad memories?_

Ami stared at her blankly, not quite sure how to respond. “No. Just thinking of a past target."

She turned her head away from Meilen. Pity, sympathy, regret, _understanding_ —if Ami looked at her right now, she would surely drown in it. Drown and never come back. 

_If you let these emotions catch up to you, little one, then nightmares will haunt you until the day you die._

Back then, when she was younger and a little more innocent than she was now, Ami had asked what she was talking about. _Nightmares?_ She had said, looking up from her studies. _What kind?_

_So much the better if you don’t know,_ she had told her, patting her on the head. _But one day you’ll come to realize the truth. If you surround yourself with horrors, you will become numb. If you walk out into the light, it’ll only burn you. At the very least, you can recognize that, don’t you?_

Ami had nodded, still not fully comprehending. But now she understood. Her teacher—the one who picked her out from the rows of orphans, the one who gave her a name, the one who raised her—had been right. She was always right. 

Yes, truly . . .

These feelings were such a pain to deal with.

**Author's Note:**

> please leave kudos or constructive criticism if you liked it! Maybe I'll turn this into a series or something if I feel like it. I need more fanfiction to fuel my obsession and if I don't get it I'll continue to throw out one-shots lol


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